FESTIVE FUN!

Hey Hey! How was every one's weekend? We lived it up Christmas style and did two of the most festive things I can think of: looked at Christmas lights and went to a Christmas party. Doesn't get much better than that! There is this monster size cave that is under the city and every year they have a car tour through it so you can see their decked out Christmas lights. We have never been to it before so decided to give it a go. Verdict: thumbs up. Probably won't pay to see it again, but glad I went. After that, we drove around the city trying to find great homes that are decked out, just for fun, and stumbled upon what can only be described as this: Griswald's. If you don't know what I am talking about then you probably live under a rock or were deprived as a child. National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation is probably one of the greatest holiday movies of.all.time. I CANNOT BELIEVE I didn't snap some pictures of this beauty, and it is so overwhelming with lights that I may make the hubby find the house for me again just so I can show it to you all.

I used my ah-mazing bun maker that I mentioned here. It is so easy to use and looks great! The star sweater was a steal from a Target clearance rack: $9. No joke. I also rocked a new purchase, my new dark skinny jeans by Lauren Conrad for Kohl's. Love! And to top it off, my beloved animal print scarf from Charlotte Russe and my rider boots. Comfy and cute!

Entering the Cave

Saturday we had a Christmas party to go to and then went out to a bar for a bit. We had a great time. Nothing beats getting together with people, enjoying good food and having some drinks. This time of year is the best! For the party I wore a new top by, once again, Lauren Conrad for Kohl's and you can get it here. I think the pic of it online is terrible. Trust me, this is a classic top that you will keep in your closet forever. It is a silky button down and the entire shoulder area is covered in lace. It is gorgeous!

 

 

I paired the top with my beloved faux leather pants by Rock & Republic for Kohl's and some bad ass cobalt blue heels by Candies for Kohl's. Notice a pattern here? Ha! My Emerson Bangle has blue leather in the middle so it was a perfect addition to the look. Paired that with the Sparkly Spiral Bardot Bangle, Rebel Pendant Necklace and my Michael Kor's rose gold watch. Love!



Need to change the date on my watch. ha

For the Christmas party I made layered taco dip (mmm...) and two kinds of cookies. Double Chocolate Chip and Pumpkin with icing. So good!! I ate a ton of batter while making them. Whoops. Check it out!

Mmm...

And, to continue with the festiveness, I had to wear my apron while making said cookies. I'm a nerd, and I don't care!

Now it is time for me to be a bum and lay on the couch with the hubs. Lazy Sunday indeed!


xoxo  MaryBeth

 

 

 

WEEKEND WHIRLWIND

Hey Ladies!! Happy Monday(not!)! I hope you had a great weekend. Ours was fun! Friday the hubs and I stayed in and grilled up some dinner and drank beer together. Although we both really enjoy going out on the town, we also really enjoy just chilling at our house and having fun together :)  Especially all the work we have put in to our home, we want to enjoy it!! This is what I wore on Friday:

I rocked one of my beloved v-neck long-sleeve shirts from Forever21 and my faux leather leggings. As I said before, I usually don't wear these as pants but rather under something else, but my tribal open cardigan is so thick and long that I felt comfortable. The grey thigh high socks are from Kohl's and I also have them in black. They are great for layering under boots and are very warm and comfy. And since I wore them with my rider boots that aren't thigh high, I just scrunched them down. Super cute! And to top it all off, my studded headband in silver and those mauve/burgundy lips I mentioned here. Now, about those lips... I LOVED it!! It took the hubs just a second to get used to them, but then he decided he actually really liked it and even went so far as to describe how the dark lips brought out the contouring that I had done with my makeup. It's hilarious when guys get excited about something totally girly! ha! Take a look:

 

The only problem with rocking bold lips like this is that kissing is absolutely off limits! (unless your man is okay with having colored lips! haha) So for dinner we grilled up some steak and green pepper, asparagus on the stove top and two potatoes in the microwave. We didn't plan enough in advance to put the potatoes on the grill. They take soo long!

Mmmm....

For the asparagus I sprayed some olive oil on the pan, added the fresh asparagus, and topped it with just a sprinkle of water, pepper, sea salt and garlic salt. I just mixed it all up in the pan so the asparagus got the olive oil on it and then put the lid on, flipping and mixing occasionally. I like my asparagus to be really well cooked and I just kind of eyeball it as far as time goes.

I like to top my sweet potato with I Can't Believe It's Not Butter and some cinnamon. Yum!

And the hubs' potato was covered in olive oil and sea salt prior to cooking. He then topped it with I Can't Believe It's Not Butter and some sour cream. The green pepper was cut and wrapped in tin foil. I sprayed it with olive oil and added pepper and garlic salt. Tossed it on the grill with the steaks and voila! It was all delish!!

And the best part of all: the beer. Ha! As mentioned before, our grocery has a section of loose beers that you can create your own 6-pack of beer. I decided to go this route because there were so many beers that I wanted to try and it made more sense to spend $8.99 for six beers instead of having to by an entire 6-pack of each of the different beers I wanted, which would definitely cost more than $8.99 ha! I got two of the Samuel Adams Octoberfest because it looked really good!

Our Alma Mater had a neat event on campus earlier this year to promote all the local beer and wine makers and we  used the sweet glasses we got for attending.

On Saturday we went and tailgated the UofL football game and it.was.cold. The weather was awful but they pulled out the win! Here's what I wore:

I wore my fleece North Face hat that I got at an outlet and my super warm, super worth the investment, down feather North Face jacket. This sucker is warm and I love it! I got it last year for a little under $200. The red sweater, plaid scarf, jeans and black boots are from Charlotte Russe. PHEW! I guess I like that store! ha! And of course, some coffee was a must for the tailgate. I went with my usual, tall skinny vanilla latte, and the hubs went with the grande Pike's Place roast (and some beers).

Work on Sunday was not too bad. The weekends are usually not bad and we all try to have fun and make the most of it. Today is an off day from work and I've already got some laundry done, all the Halloween decorations down (sad face) and got my workout in. Here's what I wore:

I am so pale.... ha!

 I rocked this fab hooded running top by Nike and my Nike Tempo running shorts. I swear by these running shorts! I have them in about six different colors. They are perfectly comfortable and I am obsessed with them. I have to control myself and not buy more and more (they have SO many colors and patterns to choose from) until the ones I have get worn down. They usually are around $28 which is a great price for what you are getting. Mine last forever! Which is both good and bad because I just want to have an excuse to buy more! ha! Under my top I wore one of my retired tanks from Target.

A great feature of this running top is that it has built in gloves. You can wear it this way, with just your thumb through the hole, or you can pull the extra flap out and it becomes a mitten, covering your fingers. How fab?!

So, after my workout I ran by the grocery to snag some seasonal coffee. And, you guessed it, Pumpkin Spice was my final pick! haha It's a serious addiction that I may need to seek counseling for. There is a machine that will grind the beans for you. Sometimes if the prepackaged flavor I want is only available in whole bean I will just open the bag, pour the beans in, grind and then place them back in the original bag. But, the pumpkin spice flavor wasn't available in a prepackaged bag, so I used the bags provided and wrote my flavor down. Yum!

Ohh Yeahh

I really like Stevia. Don't get me wrong, I'll use Sweet 'n Low, or any other substitute for that matter, if I'm in a bind. But, when I am at home we use Stevia. It just makes me feel better, even if there really is no difference. haha


Hope you have a fabulous week! That wedding day photo post is coming, and I can't wait to share the recent purchases I just made at Forever21 online. I hope they are just as gorg in person as they look on the internet! Still waiting on my Stella & Dot loot to show up on my doorstep, and when it does I'll be sure to share.


xoxo MaryBeth

HALLOWEEN HAPPINESS

Hey Ladies!! Happy Halloween! I love love love this time of year and cannot wait to hand out candy at my house tonight and watch, "The Nightmare Before Christmas" (for the third time in like five days)! The hubs might break out that Popeye costume again tonight! haha too funny.  So I worked the past two days and was thankful for the chance to sleep in a little bit this morning. I hit the gym, grocery store, post office and vet. Poor Charlie has issues with his, well how do I put this.. anal glands. Haha We have to start taking him occasionally to the vet to get them, "expressed", otherwise they clog (which has happened twice now) and cause him to get VERY sick. And when the gland gets clogged it then ruptures leaving a, literally, hole near his bottom. Both times it happened he started acting very strange, wouldn't eat anything, moped around acting sad and winds up on antibiotics. So today I decided it was probably time to be proactive and get him checked out. Five minutes and $15 later, I have a happy Charlie. Winston came for the ride and I'm sure he snickered to Charlie in their dog language that he didn't have to go in to the vet but that Charlie did. Ha! Speaking of my dog-children, these are their festive outfits for Halloween:

my little bat!

my little spider!

I snagged some great finds at the grocery store that I am pretty excited about. In fact, I was so excited apparently, that I left my IPhone and wallet in the shopping cart and didn't realize it until I was in my driveway!! I. freaked. out. Luckily I literally live one block from there and was able to go to the shopping cart collector thing and grab my belongings (before someone else did!). PHEW! Here's my finds:

Butternut Squash

Now, I've never cooked with butternut squash before so I am super excited to try it out tonight. I am thinking about just roasting it in the oven with some olive oil, sea salt and maybe a bit of cinnamon or brown sugar. I want to keep intact it's healthy side, so I'm not gonna smother it in butter or anything. I'll share the results and some pics later.

"keen-wa"

Quinoa is another item I have never cooked before, and this one the hubs is a little skeptical about. We shall see! I follow a few blogs and always here about "keen-wa" (still not sure how to pronounce it, ha!) and decided to go for it. I am usually a pretty healthy eater but sometimes I lack variety, so I am trying to branch out. I'll also let you know how this one turns out. And there are a TON of things you can do with Quinoa, so it may take a few experiments to figure out how exactly I will use this item.

mmmm

I bet this looked a little funny in my shopping cart sitting next to my butternut squash, quinoa, greek yogurt, apples, bananas, milk, eggs and deli meat. haha I love to indulge (sometimes a little too much!). I think I am going to save these bad boys for Thanksgiving. We are going to my parent's for Thanksgiving this year and I should probably contribute something. I think these will hit. the. spot.

I raved about the less-healthy version of this before, so I am hoping this healthier version is just as good. Edy's is so delicious! This, too, probably looked funny in my cart and I am also going to save this for another time. It will be awaiting me in the freezer until that eventful day when I decide to crack in to it. My plan is to remain on a healthy path between now and Thanksgiving and it is nice to have some things to look forward to.

My workout today consisted of running three miles, walking on an incline for one mile, squats, abs and free weights. After my recent attack of, "cantstopeatingcandy-itis" it felt oh so good to break a good sweat! I didn't snap a pic on my way OTD so here is a workout pic I took this weekend and forgot to share.

C9 by Champion for Target $19.99
Long-sleeve 1/4 Zip Microlite Top

The 1/4 zip long sleeve top and the below-know crop pants are both from Target by Champion. I love both so much! The pants have seams in strategic places for added comfort and style! So comfy! I can't find them on the website right now but there are many different styles and very affordable. The top also comes in a few different colors so you can spice things up!

After my errands and workout, I decided to wear something other than workout clothes! Figured I would look decent for my trick-or-treaters. Here's my look:

Stella & Dot $49
Fox Ring

The faux leather leggings are the ones I raved about here, and may fabulous boots from Charlotte Russe were mentioned here. SO COMFORTABLE and super cute!! My zip down dress is from Forever21 a few years ago, so sorry, no link! I love it though, and it has hung around for a while. And what can beat this Stella & Dot ring! I die! It reminds me of my doggies and it is too damn cute! It is from the Alice by Temperley for Stella & Dot collection and I am in love. Unfortunately, this collection is limited edition, so it won't be around forever!


What are your plans for Halloween? Whatever they are, have fun and be safe!!!


PS  So growing up my whole life in St. Louis, when we went trick-or-treating we always had to tell a joke to the person who opened the door and it wasn't until after you told your joke that you got candy. Apparently, here in Louisville there is no such thing! How sad! I remember the week leading up to Halloween my friends and I would go through our arsenal of jokes and make sure we were prepared. The jokes were along the lines of this (we were in grade school, mind you), "why did the golfer wear two pairs of pants? In case he got a hole in one". haha too cute. I think it is a great tradition, and although I'm not sure when, how, or why it is that way in St. Louis, I think Louisville should join in on the trend!


Happy Halloween!!


xoxo MaryBeth

EPIC FAIL OF FALL (and a win)

Is it just me, or is it so hard not to consume every and anything, "spiced" or "pumpkin" flavored this time of year?! I cannot get enough! So when I saw these gems at the grocery store, I thought for sure it would be an epic day.. not so much.

source

I'm not even sure where to begin. It was just all sorts of wrong. My original intent was to make those delicious sugar cookies and plop a spiced kiss in the middle of each. But once I tasted one of them, said cookies remained in their unopened, sad little box. I even tried to pawn my candies off to the girls at work, which is usually a sure way of getting rid of any unwanted, edible item. I think everyone tried one, which is the only reason the bag disappeared.

Anyways, enough about the fail. Here is the win, and boy was it a big one. It literally tastes like eating a piece of pumpkin pie with just the right amount of cool whip on top! I really needed this after my Hershey kiss miss. But like they say, you can have too much of a good thing. Haven't found my limit yet with this one, but I'm sure I have one. Any stomachache would be well worth it though!

One of my fellow nurses so kindly brought in spiced tea, cinnamon vanilla creamer and recyclable cups with lids for all of us at work today. It was the sweetest gesture. Aside from putting in too much creamer (a problem I seem to have), it was warm, cozy and delicious!

Anything "spice" or "pumpkin" related that you have tried lately that hit. the. mark. ?

Next up on the blog is the long awaited reveal on those amazing faux leather pants I have. I'll also share some of my other faux leather loves.

xoxo MaryBeth